Sri Lanka Grenade Blast Kills Four

Published 7:00 pm, Friday, March 8, 2002

A grenade exploded at an election rally of Sri Lanka's governing party near the capital, killing at least four people and wounding 20 others, police and a party official said Saturday.

Sri Lanka goes to the polls March 20-25 to elect provincial councils. The election will also be a test of the popularity of the United National Front, which won violence-plagued parliamentary elections on Dec. 5.

"Someone threw a grenade," said Rajitha Senaratne, the government minister for land reforms, of the incident late Friday. He said he was told by rally organizers that at least four people were killed in the attack.

A senior police official said another 20 were injured, three of them seriously. The officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said no arrests have been made. All the victims were supporters of the United National Front.

The front's main rival in the provincial council elections is President Chandrika Kumaratunga's People's Alliance.

In the parliamentary elections, the front won 129 of 225 seats. The People's Alliance and its allies secured only 96 seats.

Elections in Sri Lanka are often violent. The December parliamentary vote was the most violent ever, with 62 deaths and over 300 wounded.

Sri Lanka, a teardrop-shaped island just off the tip of India, has been a parliamentary democracy since winning independence from Britain in 1948. It was known as Ceylon until 1972.

Since 1983, Sri Lanka has fought an insurgency with the Tamil Tiger guerrillas, who are pressing for a separate homeland. The government signed a cease-fire with the rebels last month, renewing hopes for peace. More than 65,000 people have been killed in 18 years of terrorism and government retaliation.